


Diversity Index

by Semianonymity



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Botany, Gen, Worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-05
Updated: 2018-04-05
Packaged: 2019-04-18 22:41:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,240
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14223354
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Semianonymity/pseuds/Semianonymity
Summary: For Star Fever! This is a fic set in the same universe as the wonderful Dogmatix and Norcumi'sA Star to Steer By.Averages for the diversity of species on Earth range five million (a conservative estimate) to twenty-five million (generous) to one trillion (unlikely, but provides a degree of scale.)Ecosystems as they are presented in Star Wars tend to have exceptionally limited flora and fauna. A planet can have under 50 species, or under ten species, with half of those species found on other planets as well. Compared to Earth, the trend is a fraction of the genetic diversity, and a flexible attitude towards introducing exotic species.Some scientists of varying species and disciplines end up talking about that, at length.





	Diversity Index

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [A Star to Steer By](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3514793) by [dogmatix](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dogmatix/pseuds/dogmatix), [norcumi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/norcumi/pseuds/norcumi). 



> This is entirely because I am easily frustrated by incomplete worldbuilding, and most worldbuilding is _woefully_ incomplete.

It was a lot like any other meeting involving politics. There was better catering than the universities ever decided to provide, or the conferences; over half the attendees looked very uncomfortable in their dress-up clothes; Doctors Mary Kirkland and Mary Garg were being steered away from each other by anyone in the room who knew either of them, because a shouting match about the classification of the upper levels of the Liliales was hilarious in a pub after a conference, less amusing when you were supposed to be impressing diplomats.

And, you know, _aliens_. Alien diplomats, even.

Because that was their reality now. Aliens.

Malaika took another bite of flaky-pastry-from-culture-of-indeterminable-provenance and frowned. Slightly soggy, and lukewarm, as these sorts of buffets often were. Even when they _did_ pay for the nice catering. At least someone--probably thinking themselves quite clever--had arranged for a variety of crudites and fresh fruit that went far beyond the usual carrot sticks, dry celery, hard cantaloupe and soggy grapes.

They were still waiting for the Jedi delegation, which was apparently running late. It left a weird tension to the room, the conversation subdued and obviously _waiting_. Not an ideal situation to start a discussion on how robust the orchid phylogeny she was working on was. ...Plus it would probably get Kirkland and Garg started again. _Taxonomy_. There really wasn’t a lot of overlap in their research matter--Malaika thought orchids were more than enough for several lives’ worth of work. But at least they could talk derivation and ancestral traits and bootstrapping, while--for example--Dr. King, whom she recognized only from his picture on his website, was all about the intersections of bioengineering, crop diversity, and subsistence farming yields. ...Maybe they could talk sequencing techniques?

...Or she could finish her cup of tea and track down a washroom.

Or not, she concluded, as the door swung open, and a roomfull of obviously distracted biologists swiveled almost as one, the murmur of halting conversation coming to a grinding, obvious stop.

Malaika swallowed.

“Are they _lost?_ ” the vaguely-governmental person on the other side of the door blurted out, in response to the lack of alien diplomats. Dr. Burdgett--Ethel, as she insisted on being called, top of the field in the genetic underpinnings of variable crop yields, a lady of a certain age who stayed at the forefront of research anyway--snorted loudly, and unsuccessfully tried to turn it into a laugh.

That honestly seemed to help, and the room dissolved into easier conversation, laughter and jokes. Sure, maybe the alien ( _alien_ ) delegation was lost somewhere, but this was a strange, artificial sort of situation. They had massed a group of the world’s foremost botanic and agricultural researches, meaning the world’s most dedicated plant nerds, and told them to be (temporary) diplomats. Not in the sense of actually determining anything--thankfully; Malaika was pretty sure that she could start a fistfight if she got Garg and Kirkland going, with the addition of her own opinions, plus some of the corn, wheat and rice specialists. People were generally willing to agree on what made a plant a grass, but when you got into how the grasses were related to the Asparagales were related to the Liliales, things could get heated.

Maybe Garg and Kirkland would start an interstellar incident! That’d be a story for the grad students, if it didn’t end with the Earth being vaporized.

That’d be a pity. Malaika had a burning need to know more about what sort of plants filled the orchid niche on alien planets.

That was the thing. The announcements of aliens-- _aliens!_ \--had been a terrible shock, but after the dust from that impact had settled down--after that, there were _implications_. Alien plants. Alien _botanists_. 

Also the whole question of how people--or, rather, human people, and that was quite the distinction to need to make--weren’t, apparently, endemic to Earth. _That_ had evolutionary implications, and so far, nobody was saying anything.

A side door, discreet in a way that indicated it was for staff and should be ignored by everyone else, was pushed open, and a motley group of people--aliens-- _alien people_ peered through. Behind her, someone choked, and someone else--Ethel--bit back an uncharacteristically hysterical giggle.

Two coalitions of people blinked at each other. It was a mix of dress uniform--recognizable dress uniform--and alien armor and equally-alien robe-like-maybe-still-martial clothing on the one side. Malaika had a sudden impulse to panic about potentially chatting with a _general_ , which was at least a kind of imaginable awful she had a yardstick for.

She was curious about what they saw when they looked at them.

“ _Why are the generals here,_ ” the vaguely-governmental-agent behind them stage-whispered, apparently adrift in despair. Hopefully he had an--a communicator, or secret service earpiece, or something like that, with someone on the other side to answer him.

“We found it,” the blond man--blond _clone_ \--in armor said, before his eyes changed color to a pale blue, of all things. It was unsettling, Malaika thought. 

The Jedi took over speaking. “I’m afraid we got slightly lost--” one of the men in (American) military uniform behind him snickered-- “But I’d like to introduce some of the more recent arrivals to this galaxy.” His voice had gravity, and a subdued sort of friendly that seemed pitched to drive through the miasma of suffocating pressure and awkward expectation. “Our Agricorps representatives, headed by Jedi Master T’ra Saa and Host Hrah Ftah, accompanied by--”

Names washed over Malaika, not leaving much of an impression. She bit back the hysterical urge to raise her hand and wait for permission to ask a question, like she was in a lecture hall. Odds even what the question would be about: how they were supposed to comport themselves in this situation in anything even remotely resembling a natural and polite way, or something about how they structured their basic naming system for organisms in space. Under the assumption that it wasn’t binomial Latin.

Who was it who thought that mingling _before_ the introductory lecture series was a good idea? ...and why had no one invited any geologists. Because the closest they had was Dr. Olawa, who specialized in nitrogen fixation. True, “AgriCorps” wasn’t a group name that made her think of geology, but it also made a great deal of sense. Surely, they could have asked.

...Of course no one had asked.

Even Garg and Kirkland were looking somewhat subdued, because none of them were the sort of people you’d call on to make small talk over crudites and very tiny blini. At least not unless they were talking to their sort of people, about their sort of thing. ...Which they were also, in a way, supposed to be. Except sans a common vocabulary. Or, really, any frame of reference at all, from her side at least. Maybe the other delegation had been given some sort of briefing.

She grabbed Kirkland by the sleeve as she went past, Dr. Burdgett following in their wake, and headed somewhat-determinedly towards the nearest alien. --that surely wasn’t the right way to refer to them. But. “Doctor-- ah, no, sorry,” Malaika centered herself, tried again, accompanied by an embarrassed smile. “I’m afraid I’m not sure how to address you,” she said, instead.

“You can call me Cut,” he offered, looking maybe a little relieved. Certainly pleased. “And my wife, Suu Lawquaine, and Jedi Kihit.” Host Suu was a striking shade of fuchsia, and the large--protuberances from her head were evolutionarily unclear in purpose, in a way that struck Malaika as potentially sexual selection.

“--Cut, then, if you won’t provide a title, and Host Suu and Jedi Kihit. It’s very nice to meet you! I’m Malaika, this is Doctor Mary Kirkland, and Doctor Ethel Burdgett.” It was the appropriate time for polite small talk, but that hadn’t been going anywhere. She was terrible at it, anyway. “I’m not sure where to start, but I was wondering--how do you classify the relationships between plants? I mean--”

“We lack a fundamental vocabulary,” Dr. Burdgett cut in, clearly desperate for answers. Dr. Sirisopa was listening in, not very subtly.

Malaika cut in again. “It’s fairly obvious,” a gesture at the people in the room who were _Homo sapiens,_ “that there is at least some carryover in common species, but I’m terribly curious about how _much_. But of course, asking about asters and orchids, or even vascular versus nonvascular, isn’t going to produce a helpful answer.” It was a little hard not to feel as nervous as a high schooler.

“A good question! I’ve never been in this situation before--vascular?” Suu said, looking fascinated.

“Having specialized cells for the purpose of transporting water or nutrients within the plant,” Kirkland said, promptly; Suu was nodding in agreement, recognition. “One of the fundamental divisions. What are the photosynthetic pigments? Oh, shit, there’s no saying that molecular representations will carry through--”

“I’ll be right back,” Malaika said, and hurried back over to the chair where she’d left her large purse.

Because she’d brought reference books, of course. And hadn’t wanted to keep 15 pounds of paper slung over her shoulder.

“Oh, excuse me,” she said, pushing past a group of people a little rudely, only to wince when she realized it was a cluster of some of the more _important-looking_ people. And Garg--that was good, actually. “I’m sorry! I’m just--would one of you pass me the purse on the table?”

“Good lord, Malaika,” Garg blurted out, passing over the bag. “Are there bricks in here?”

“Um,” Malaika said, extricating _Plant Systematics_ from the somewhat stressed cloth of her purse. And then, a little sheepishly, _Taxonomy of Plants_ and _Plant Physiology_. And a large binder, filled with printed sheets of paper, labelled “APG - Reference” in a clear hand.

“APG?” one of the--well, one of the planetary natives asked.

“Angiosperm Phylogeny Group,” Garg and Malaika said more-or-less in unison. “Malaika’s an author,” Garg added, the traitor.

“So that would make you one of the people responsible for the butchered Latin, I suppose?” a man in glasses asked. “Daniel Jackson, it’s a pleasure.”

“Oh! Introductions--I’m Malaika Kezilahabi. But, no, it’s _tradition_ that’s responsible for the butchered Latin, I’m afraid. I simply collate and synthesize for the APG. --My research is primarily in orchids, especially neotropical orchids. It’s a terrible mess, really.”

“And in addition to Doctor Jackson, there’s also Jedi Obi-Wan Kenobi and Host Rex, along with Jedi Ahsoka Tano and Host Echo.”

“A mess?” Obi-Wan asked, reaching out to shake Malaika’s hand.

“The Orchidaceae has more species than any other plant family,” Malaika said, cheerfully. “And under artificial conditions, you can hybridize between genera. A nightmare!”

“So that’s where you went,” Kirkland said, enthusiastically elbowing her way in-between Garg and Malaika. “Oooo, references! One I co-authored, even.”

“I’ve got someone looking for paper, and someone else for a whiteboard,” Dr. Burdgett said enthusiastically. “Malaika, _Malaika_ , this is--there’s monocots, and eudicots and basal angiosperms, and in space they have _tricots_. --Named differently, obviously, but it’s the logical choice for translation, as far as I’m concerned.”

“Oh! Oh but--you mean eudicots that are monophyletic with our--but no, before we get _any further_ , I need to know if there are orchids in space. Homologous or analogous. So--”

She went for a diagram, cheerfully ignoring any complaints. “Bilateral symmetry, six tepals, fused stamens and carpels, pollen grains packed together into little sticky packets in the majority of orchid species, exceptionally small seeds--”

“I recognize those,” Suu said, enthusiastic. “Most of my work is with food crops, but we have a type--you called them orchids?--a type of orchid that’s a problem in fruit trees. Another that’s grown to produce a flavoring compound--”

“Space vanilla!” Malaika cheered, a little too loud. “Even if it doesn’t taste like vanilla. Oh goodness, that is _so_ exciting, and also--well, my job just went from hard to impossible!”

“Your job?” Rex asked. Cut and Host Suu--no, Jedi Kihit, the eyes had changed--looked distinctly baffled.

“Determining the evolutionary relationships between orchid taxa,” Malaika said.

“...you _do_ have basic gene sequencing technology though, don’t you?”

“Yes? I mean--it’s recent, it’s been a major shake-up of our understanding of phylogeny, but we certainly base all current--and non-extinct--classifications on molecular data. I’m sure you’re all leagues ahead of us, all things considered, but--no, we do quite a bit of sequencing.”

“So why is it something that needs _determining_?” Jedi Ahsoka asked, young and fairly clearly confused. “If you can know--”

“Somewhere between twenty and thirty thousand named species of orchids in eight or nine hundred genera? With hybridization and convergence and drift and viral insertions and polyploidy? We’re certainly not advanced enough for _that_ to be easy. Not without a lot more funding and several more lifetimes.”

“That can’t be right,” Cut said, frowning.

“ _How_ many-- I think I need to reconfirm that I have the right definition for species.” That was Jedi Obi-Wan.

“Jack isn’t always--exact,” Dr. Jackson said, apparently amused, somewhat cryptically. The next sentence, an apparent translation or explanation, wasn’t exactly helpful to her, but did seem to mean something to the alien delegation.

“...twenty to thirty _thousand_ species of orchid?” Kihit said, looking stunned. 

“So that’s your dominant plant family?” Obi-Wan asked, looking surprised. “I’m not in the AgriCorps, but I did learn my basics, and I never would have thought.”

Now Malaika was increasingly confused, too. “Dominant? In what sense? I mean--there are more orchid species than any other plant family--”

“Except for maybe the Asteraceae,” Garg cut in, looking smug. Malaika graciously ignored her.

“But in terms of biomass or ecosystem importance or agricultural use, they’re really not very important. The only uses for orchids are as ornamental flowers, with vanilla the rare culinary exception, and a few local uses. For the most part, though, they’re not agriculturally important, just diverse.”

Suu and Cut were sharing a long look.

“But _why_ is that surprising?” Kirkland asked. “I mean--if you have orchids, surely you’re into the millions of species of orchids, with the number of planets.”

“What’s your diversity in _other_ groups?” Suu asked, intently.

“Plants or otherwise?” asked Malaika, single-minded to the end.

“Are we including just eukaryotes, or do we have to come up with numbers for archaebacteria and eubacteria, too?” Dr. Sirisopa asked, a touch ironically, no longer even pretending he wasn’t eavesdropping.

“Around one million named species, with estimates for actual diversity ranging from five to twenty-five million extant species,” Malaika said crisply.

“Or the one trillion that one study came up with,” Kirkland said brightly.

“But there are estimates of insect diversity alone that go up to 30 million,” Dr. Burdgett added.

The group of off-world visitors was, to a soul, staring at them with something like stunned shock.

“...What’s standard?”

“I think that, collectively, there’s ten species of orchid in the Republic,” Jedi Kihit said, slowly.

“...million?” Malaika asked, carefully, but Cut just shook his head.

\----------

Two hours later, surrounded by scribbled notes in at least four languages, Malaika thought they were looking at the heart of the problem: Earth had a diversity that was highly unusual. They were missing some groups of plants that were common elsewhere, including some very basal ones, and had at least a handful that were unique, or probably unique, to Earth. Mostly, there was a great deal of overlap, not at the species level but the higher ones. They could see how Earth plants fit into the interstellar botanic landscape.

It was simply a matter of the degree of diversity.

Roughly fifty main types of grain crops on Earth. Roughly twenty grain crops, combined, on all the planets the AgriCorps were present. Twenty-five thousand species of orchid on Earth, four orders of magnitude more than those found on all the planets of the Republic. Under a million named species of insects, total, shared between eight hundred planets, and as many as thirty million potentially present on Earth alone.

“So there’s definite homology,” Malaika said, carefully, studying the differences between the two species of aphid that apparently lived on more worlds than not, plaguing farmers as they went. Like Earth aphids, except that there were only _two_ species. Instead of four thousand.

“Is it a _genetic_ difference?” Cut muttered, giving a rough phylogeny--different branches circled with different colors to distinguish presence and absence--a very dirty look.

“A planet-wide tendency towards higher mutation rates,” Ethel muttered. “Except that doesn’t quite fit, either. Why is chocolate widespread but bananas and apples localized to Earth?”

“I’m _very_ curious to see how this planet’s food crops will do in other systems,” Suu said, shaking her head. “And how our basic crops will respond to your system. It’s going to be fascinating, tracking the mutation rates.”

“Other systems?” Malaika said, suddenly concerned. “But--the potential for invasives--how _do_ you determine if something’s a threat to the stability of an ecosystem? Especially when you’re potentially introducing something to _many_ ecosystems? I mean, no natural controls--”

“What are you talking about? Of course we introduce plants to a variety of different worlds--”

“ _Absolutely not_ ,” Ethel Burdgett snapped, pale with fury and horror. She was wrinkled and delicate, and absolutely ready to go toe-to-toe with a Jedi, physically, if necessary. “What are the extinction rates like? Is that--”

“I think there’s been a misunderstanding,” Obi-Wan tried.

“So, what is the process when you introduce a new species?” Malaika asked, already trying to pull up and condense her lesson plans from BIO6230, Invasive Plant Ecology.

“Ensure no lingering pests or pathogens, via sterile tissue cloning if necessary, and then plant it. Is that the concern? Introducing new diseases?”

“Yes and no,” Garg said, horrified at the very thought of willy nilly introductions of novel species, but morbidly curious despite herself. “You never have a plant just--take over? Grow over everything in its path, including trees, houses, _everything_?”

“...No,” Kihit said, Cut a beat behind her.

“Whoa,” Kirkland said, stunned. “The fuck?”

“That’s _normal_ here?”

“Kudzu,” Ethel said, listing off on her fingers. “Garlic mustard, Japanese knotweed, a number of _Centaurea_ species, bush honeysuckle, hogweed, English ivy, toadflax, jewelweed, at least two species of roses. I could continue.”

“Most of those can’t overgrow an actual house,” Garg added helpfully.

“They don’t just find an equilibrium?”

There was another long pause.

“We need to have a very, very long talk--a series of talks--about invasive species and naive communities and environmental resilience,” Dr. Burdgett concluded, her voice oh-so-very-dry. “But I have suspicions that there’s a link between the degree of diversity and environmental resilience. Or maybe we’ll finally have a better answer to the why-the-tropics-have-more-biodiversity question.”

“And I want to know what your forests _look_ like,” Kihit said, as close to bouncing in place as a mature Jedi ever really got.

Malaika was already trying to figure out how she could get at least one alien diplomat out into a rainforest. Without causing an international incident. Or an interstellar one.

Also, trying to figure out how quickly she could get off-planet. Travel had never been a passion for her, but she also didn’t mind it, and now there were _space orchids_. Even better? Space orchids limited to a few clearly-delineated species and families, easy to slot into place on a phylogeny. Imagine that.

-End-

**Author's Note:**

> Some fun facts!
> 
> -The StSB canon characters were definitely playing hooky to a different gala they didn't want to attend, in addition to providing some backup for the less diplomatically-inclined AgriCorps members.  
> -Nobody ever did think to ask what AgriCorps did in more _concrete_ terms before they made the guest list, they just assumed all plants and went with it. There are a number of livestock scientists peeved about that, not to mention the geologists, mycologists, phytopathologists, etc.  
>  -The entire AgriCorps contingent slipped away from their handlers a week later and were found five miles away, in the woods, knee deep in mud, learning about salamanders and skunk cabbage with several enthusiastic botanists.  
> -Related to above: Eastern skunk cabbage, _Symplocarpus foetidus_ , is one of the only thermogenic plants, meaning it produces its own heat and literally melts through the frozen ground in the spring. It also contracts its roots to pull itself deeper into the ground over time, effectively burying itself.  
> -In the real world, more diverse ecosystems tend to be more robust--meaning, the more moving parts to an ecosystem, the less likely an interruption (eg an invasive) will be harmful/the amount of harm will be reduced.


End file.
